Baroque Architecture. MICHETTI. Breve descrizzione... della Cappella Dedicata a S. Giuseppe nella Chiesa di S. Ignatio dell [..]

4to; 230x165 mm.; [4] leaves, (last leaf blank), woodcut initial. Disbound, as issued, but with traces of having been in a binding for some time. Slightly browning, good copy.

Only edition. An architectural and iconographic guide of the chapel of St. Joseph in the Jesuit church of S. Ignazio in Rome, a magnificent example of late Roman Baroque. In 1712 Cardinal Giuseppe Sacripanti decided to modernize the chapel dedicated to St. Joseph and entrusted the altar design to Nicola Michetti: the chapel has since been known under the name “Cappella Sacripante”. Nicola Michetti, 1677-1758, worked in Rome with Carlo Fontana and his son Francesco and he performed some architectural projects as well as ephemeral sacred and profane apparatuses. He spent some years in Russia, where the Tsar Peter the Great commissioned him designs for the residence Ekaterinenthal and for the palace and gardens of Strel´na. In 1719, upon the death of Jean-Baptiste Le Blond, responsible for the urban plan of St. Petersburg, Michetti was appointed general architect and performed several projects in the Peterhof gardens, near the capital. Back in Rome, thanks to the fame acquired in Russia he obtained the title of “Cavaliere” and, in 1725, the election as architect of merit of the Academy of S. Luca; on 26 May 1730 Michetti was appointed architect of the Apostolic Chamber by Pope Clement XII. 

OCLC n. 1002752839; Filippo Vignato: Michetti, Nicola In: Dizionario Biografico degli Italiani.